


a burden shared

by manycoloureddays



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-16
Updated: 2015-03-16
Packaged: 2018-03-18 04:05:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3555398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/manycoloureddays/pseuds/manycoloureddays
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"It was Miller.<br/>Of course it was Miller."</p>
            </blockquote>





	a burden shared

                Clarke had promised in those early days on Earth that she would never abandon them. Monty couldn’t believe he missed the days when Jasper had been impaled and they didn’t know where their next meal was coming from. Turns out committing genocide to save your family left you with changed priorities. He had irradiated Mt Weather, condemning the innocent as well as the guilty to a painful death, and then Clarke had gone and broken her promise. He didn’t blame her. Wished he could join her, sure, but he didn’t blame her for needing space. No longer living inside a falling to pieces metal box and still he felt trapped, suffocated. He wouldn’t leave though. He couldn’t leave Jasper, even now. He couldn’t leave Harper to face the nightmares of drills and cages alone. He couldn’t leave Raven and Octavia and Bellamy now that they were all back together. He couldn’t leave Miller when he’d never abandoned Monty inside the mountain. So instead of going walkabout and attempting to healthily process his guilt he was sitting on a stump just outside the walls to Camp Jaha. A safe haven for people from the sky, and it was named after the wrong Jaha.

                A claustrophobic, suffocating from the memory of what you did to get here safe haven. So he’d left, fully intending to return in a few hours. He’d walked straight out of the gate. Just him and a stolen bottle of alcohol. Not quite as potent as his stash, but it seemed to be doing the trick.

                Drinking alone was sad. He was used to getting drunk, or high, or both, with Jasper. And then he hadn’t been alone in the dropship camp ever. To the point where he’d have done nearly anything for some alone time. Nearly anything did not include mass murder though. What had Earth done to him? He took another gulp from the bottle, because really that wasn’t a question he was in a hurry to answer.  

                “I thought I was the thief.” Startled – and incredibly inebriated – Monty toppled backwards off the stump in his haste to turn around.

                It was Miller.

                Of course it was Miller.

                Before Mount Weather Monty could have picked Miller out of a delinquent line up, but he wouldn’t have been able to tell you anything real about him. He could have said he was Bellamy’s right hand man, the kids trusted him, he always wore a beanie, he could outdrink just about all of them. Now though, now he could tell you that Nate had wanted to be a guard like his dad until he was 8 and his next door neighbour had been floated, he still had nightmares left over from the Sky Box of his dad stoically, unemotionally watching as he was floated, that he loved really terrible jokes, and when Monty woke in the middle of the night gasping for breath he would whisper them from the next bunk over until they were both wheezing as quietly as possible, trying to convince themselves they weren’t on the edge of hysteria. Because while Jasper had become preoccupied, with Maya, with Dante, and then eventually with playing the hero, Monty and Miller had found in each other someone who was just as suspicious and ready to do anything to help their family survive as they were.

                “You are the thief,” Monty replied. “But you don’t need to be a great thief to get away with this.” He held the bottle out. Part trophy, part offering. Miller grinned, took it from him, and drank. Monty shuffled to the side so they could both lean up against the stump, and into each other.

 

                “He’ll get over it, you know,” Miller whispered. They’d been passing the bottle back and forth in silence for a few minutes. Monty had almost managed to convince himself that there was no ulterior motive to Miller’s arrival. That he had just wanted to sit in companionable silence. Drink in commiseration, for lives and innocence lost. But no. He wanted to make Monty feel better.

                “You want to make me feel better,” Monty accused. “Well, you can’t. It’s not possible, so don’t even worry about it.” He should probably not push away one of the only people to ever choose him, instead of him AND Jasper, or him AND all the other delinquents. But he was drunk, and a killer, and entitled to be pissy.

                “I’m not trying to make you feel better. I’m stating a fact. Jasper will eventually get past the grieving and remember why you did it. He’s a dick, but he’s not stupid. You’re one of the good guys Monty, he’ll remember that eventually.” Miller paused, turning slightly to look Monty directly in the eye. “So will you.” He looked so sincere, sounded so convinced. Monty almost believed him. Almost.

                “Miller, I,” he huffed, trying to sort out the words, sluggish and jumbled as they were in his head. “I’m not one of the good guys. None of us can be. Not anymore... And some of us,” he took a deep breath, closed his eyes. “Some of us are worse than just ‘not good’.” _How could you let this happen? What were we supposed to do? **Die.**_

                “You couldn’t watch when Dr Tsing died.” Monty looks over at Miller, brow furrowed, but he’s looking at his hands.

                “And?” Because really, what does that prove? That he can’t stomach the deaths he’s responsible for.

                “ _And_ , you couldn’t watch her die, and you’re worried that you’re a terrible person. I think that means there’s hope for you after all. And if there’s hope for you, there’s hope for me too.” Miller looks up then, and the look on his face is so much more devastating than the one that followed “he sure loved having a thief for a kid”. Monty needs that look to disappear forever, but he doesn’t know how to do that. He doesn’t even know how to offer what Nate’s offered him. Alleviating the guilt, forgiveness; he’d carry that burden for him, if he knew how. But he doesn’t. So he takes Miller’s hand, laces their fingers together, squeezes and promises that metaphorically he’s never letting go. Miller squeezes back. And maybe Monty hasn’t been abandoned or shafted by everyone. Maybe if he and Nate hold onto each other they can share the burden. Maybe not. But at least he won’t be drinking alone.

 


End file.
